ARLINGTON, VA -- The American Trucking Associations' advance seasonally adjusted (SA) For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index increased 2.8% in June after decreasing a revised 2.0% in May 2011.
The not seasonally adjusted index, which represents the change in tonnage actually hauled by the fleets before any seasonal adjustment, equaled 122.3 in June, which was 5.3% above the previous month.
Compared with June 2010, SA tonnage jumped 6.8%, the largest year-over-year gain since January 2011. In May, the tonnage index was 3% above a year earlier.
"After growing 5.5% in the first half of the year from the same period last year, the strength of truck tonnage in the second half will depend greatly on what manufacturing output does," Costello noted. "If manufacturing continues to grow stronger than GDP, I fully expect truck freight to do the same."